Europe

As we reported,French workers and students took to the streets on Tuesday, March 28, in a massive way. The only way the workers and youth can move forward to victory and avoid falling into tiredness and disappointment, is by declaring a proper and effective general strike aimed not only at the withdrawal of the Contrat Première Embauche but also at the unseating of the current government, which has by far overrun its mandate.

When Blair was first elected he promised his government would be ‘whiter than white’, a phrase meant to distance himself from the sleaze of the Major years. Now Blair is immersed in sleaze himself. From the lies over the Iraq war we now have the scandal of selling peerages to the biggest bidder. Blair has done his utmost to destroy the Labour Party. It will be up to the trade unions and the ranks of the party to rebuild it as a fighting workers’ organisation.

We have just been informed that yesterday the Greek government has withdrawn from its plans to close the plant in Thessaloniki. They say it will reopen "partially". This is a big victory for the workers after two months of determined struggle. For now the solidarity appeal is suspended as we await the outcome.

In the biggest strike since the historic general strike of 1926, over a million local government workers struck in defence of their pensions yesterday, March 28th. The mood on the picket lines was cheerful, buoyant and confident in what was undoubtedly the largest and most solid public sector strike ever in Britain.

Today’s strikes and demonstrations brought over three million workers onto the streets of France, with 700,000 marchers in Paris and 250,000 in Marseille. In the last 60 years, this movement has only been equalled by those of the revolutionary events of May and June 1968. It is provoking serious divisions right at the top of the ruling class, a clear symptom of revolutionary developments.

Representatives of the Editorial Board of “Marxistiki Foni” met the workers of the fertilizer factory in Thessaloniki, who had once again come down to Athens (a 6-hour train journey), to protest in front of the Ministry of Labour against the closure of their factory. We publish the announcement of their union. We should all support their struggle!

Another massive general strike rocked Greek society on March 15. This came about in a situation of growing class conflict. The result has been a big fall in support for the present right wing New Democracy government. The Greek bosses are now openly discussing the possibility of French contagion in Greece.

Hands off Venezuela in Germany played a decisively role in some successful public meetings with Che Guevara's daughter, Aleida Guevara, last week. 450 workers, youth and Latin American immigrants attended the Frankfurt meeting on Saturday, 25 March, and 250 were packed into the hall in Wiesbaden two days earlier.

This morning over 30 trade unionists turned up bright and early with placards and leaflets to stand outside the plush Marriot Hotel at County Hall in London – former headquarters of the GLC – to picket a meeting of the Amicus executive committee. The reason? To protest at the disgraceful sacking of three union employees by the union leadership.

A new and particularly vicious attack on the basic rights of young workers has led to a spectacular upsurge of protest and struggle in France. Once again, millions of students and workers have taken to the streets to defend their interests against the most reactionary government ever seen in France since the Vichy regime at the time of the Second World War.

France is in the middle of its second youth revolt in the span of just a few months time. Students and workers all across France are mobilising against the proposed First Employment Contract. A national demonstration will be held this weekend against the proposed legislation, and some 1 to 1.5 million people are expected to turn out. The stage is being set for a decisive battle between the working class and the Villepin government.

In the morning hours of Saturday, March 11, Slobodan Milosevic, was found dead in his prison cell at the Hague. With his death, the bourgeois media began once again to dig through the recent history of the Balkans in an attempt to make sense of the break-up of former Yugoslavia. But what was the role played by Milosevic, and what is the feeling over his death in Serbia?

Last Saturday around 50 people gathered in London for the Marxist.com Day School on Latin America. Alan Woods and Jorge Martin, who both just came back from Cuba, spoke on the Cuban and Venezuelan revolutions. You can also listen to Alan Woods' speech by downloading the audio file.